Call me Virginia

Christmas is so soon. The tree is up, the lights are up, the music is playing, there are some wrapped gifts under the tree (after all, Santa doesn't bring presents for Grandparents, etc.) We went to an amazing Christmas party on Sunday and B and I are really both feeling the deep love of long lasting friendships that have bloomed into family. Every time we answer the phone, it's another member of our Kohl Collection (folks who are our family whether related or not,) sending us loving wishes for the holidays. Presents and cards stuff our mailbox every single day. Every morning the kids take off one link of the Christmas chain and Duck sings Frosty and Rudolf all day long. The cleaning has started in preparation from out of town guests and my mind is thinking of menus and dietary restrictions and playlists. It's happening. It's happening now.

And this morning, I was bawling like a baby.

Christmas is hard for me. It's a very hard place to be for me because, well, I'm just like that little girl on 34th street. I believe in Santa, but do I believe in Christmas?

My father was a minister for all the years I lived with him. It doesn't get much bigger than Christmas in a house like that. Every year was a huge production. 4 weeks of Advent, each week lighting purple candles, then pink, and finally, the big white one in the middle marking Christmas. There were Christmas pageants and pot luck dinners and more hurricane lamps made out of tuna cans and candles than anyone should ever have to witness. And, on Christmas Eve, we would go to Candlelight Service at Midnight (much like Midnight Mass for Methodists.) We would hold those candles and listen to (or sing in) the choir and sing Silent Night. Some years we'd leave and it would be snowing. My father would gather us around and read The Christmas story to us from his old, worn, black Bible and we'd go to bed.

Lots of my childhood was total crap, but Christmas was magic.

Of course, we did all the secular things, too. We routinely watched Christmas Eve on Sesame Street, How the Grinch Stole Christmas, Rudolf the Red Nosed Reindeer. We made and ate peanut brittle and fudge and, on one bizarre year, we had egg nog. There was lots of traveling, lots of shopping and wrapping, lots of all of that. And it was important and fun and wonderful.

In my house, things are a little different. I'm not a Christian and neither is B and, thus, neither are our kids. This mostly has to do with our understanding that Religion is a man made creation and, once you figure that out, well, it's hard for us to be believers. We're fans of Evolution and Karma and Reincarnation and Nirvana. We're fans of deep breathing, meditation, yoga, and the healing properties of certain plants of varying legality. We commune with our Mother Earth in chapels of forests, lakes, mountains, oceans. We see miracles every single day - our children are breathing and living and learning and growing. Our community is loving each other a little bit more each and every day (seriously, DDFF, Bill, SS, ain't it a grand town?) There always seems to be more money than we thought, enough food to fill our bellies, a cozy little place to call home that is ours (well, and the bank's.) The love I have for B grows more and more by the minute and I know he feels the same way about me. We have the best friends, a wonderful widespread family, roots to our community, and a plan for the future. We're doing amazingly well and we don't owe any of that to going to church every week and pretending to ignore the hypocrisy that runs rampant in these "Houses of God." I spent every Sunday for 17 years of my life going to church and being a "good Christian." 13 years ago, I walked away from it all and haven't looked back.

Except at Christmas.

At Christmas, I struggle. I certainly don't want it to turn into some solely commercial bullshit festival, but without the belief in The Christmas Story, what else is it, really? Yes, it's true, it is a time of love and peace and hope and joy and generosity and selflessness. Frankly, it's incredibly Zen, which, of course, is right up my alley. I'd go all out and call it Buddhist, but well, Buddhism is about releasing attachments -not so much buying each other more things to which to become attached. Whatever. So, we pretty much celebrate Zenmas. Good enough.

Still, I cry at O Holy Night, God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen, Oh Come All Ye Faithful, Joy to the World. I remember those candle light services so crisply and clearly, it's like it was yesterday. I bawl and turn into a bubbling pile of Mom Snot when Linus recites the Christmas Story on Merry Christmas, Charlie Brown. Seriously, I need a sedative. It's hard for me, this dichotomy of my holiday experience.

So, where is my place in Christmas? Eh, a little of column A, a little from column B, a whole lot from column Whatever-Works. The Christmas story moves me so much that I have to allow myself to buy into it, if for no other reason than it makes everything a bit more special for me, but I don't know that I can believe it. That's okay. I don't know that I have to believe it. After all, I'll bet that Virginia would have gotten some presents that year even if she hadn't been convinced that Santa was real. I'm pretty sure I will, too.